


Leave Me Drowning

by spockandawe



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Blind Character, Depression, Gen, Getting to Know Each Other, Gift Exchange, Past Abuse, Past Character Death, Petstuck, Stereotypes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-04
Updated: 2015-01-04
Packaged: 2018-03-05 07:33:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,791
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3111377
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spockandawe/pseuds/spockandawe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After your grandpa dies, it’s so hard to… anything. It really is. The last few months have just been too much, Bec and grandpa and now you’re just left all alone in a house that’s suddenly way too large and way too empty, and you can’t get yourself to do much more than sit in bed and stare at your computer screen for days at a time. And it turns out that months of telling your friends that you’re doing fine has made you a really good liar. You’re half hurt and half relieved when they just believe you when you make excuses for why you haven’t been talking to anyone, or why you haven’t been doing anything.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Leave Me Drowning

**Author's Note:**

  * For [confiscatedretina](https://archiveofourown.org/users/confiscatedretina/gifts).



                After your grandpa dies, it’s so hard to… anything. It really is. The last few months have just been too much, Bec _and_ grandpa and now you’re just left all alone in a house that’s suddenly way too large and way too empty, and you can’t get yourself to do much more than sit in bed and stare at your computer screen for days at a time. And it turns out that months of telling your friends that you’re doing fine has made you a _really_ good liar. You’re half hurt and half relieved when they just _believe_ you when you make excuses for why you haven’t been talking to anyone, or why you haven’t been doing _anything_.

                Nothing tastes good anymore, but you make yourself keep eating. And about once a week you drag yourself out of the house to go to a grocery store. You even manage to refill your car when the low gas light comes on, and it feels like a big deal, and then you’re mad at yourself for making such a dumb little job into such a huge thing. Grandpa left you everything, and it’s going to be a while before you have to worry about running out of money, but you think it might be better if you had a job that would force you into movement. You can tell this isn’t healthy. You just can’t get yourself to do anything about it. Even after grandpa got sick for the last time and it wasn’t so much a question of _if_ , and more a question of _when_ , at least then you had Bec. You didn’t even have more than a few days warning before you lost him. At least grandpa kept you too busy to collapse, but after he died—Well.

                Anyways, because you are _definitely not_ lingering over that right now, you get that something’s wrong. You do. And you do want to fix it! It’s just. There’s so much and everything is so awful and even if you had any idea where to start, you’d never find the energy to do it. Your brain just circles between stupid, useless ideas, and you just keep sitting on your bed and staring at your computer while the whole house collects dust. And you feel awful about feeling so awful, because everyone’s grandparents die, and everyone’s dogs die, and you’re just being horrible and selfish for being so fixated on it happening to _you_ personally that you can’t even be grateful that you had grandpa and Bec with you for so long.

                It’s one of the sleepless nights when you’ve decided to mix it up (instead of staring at the computer, you’re staring at the ceiling), and most of your attention is taken up with wishing you had a huge warm dog lying uncomfortably across your legs, or suffocating you with fur in your face, or _something._ But then suddenly your brain switches gears, and you realize, oh. You could… adopt another pet? You feel a little silly, because that’s a really obvious step, but somehow it never occurred to you. Bec is Bec, there’s no replacing him, but you miss having someone around to love you and count on you _so bad_ , and you like taking care of animals a lot, you really do. You roll over far enough to grab your computer and open it up and don’t even wince much when you see it’s four in the morning, because all of a sudden you are legitimately _excited_.

                That, um. Doesn’t last too long. Browsing through dog rescue websites, the first time you see a white fuzzy dog staring back at you off the screen, you just about melt down. It’s really dumb, because the dog doesn’t even _look_ like Bec, but you just. Can’t handle it. You shut all your tabs for dog rescues, because apparently you are _all_ about stupid overreactions right now. You spend a bit browsing through cat rescues, but you’re just not feeling it. Cats are fine, you guess, but they’re not for you. Heh, even with the biggest cats you’ve ever met, you can’t ever shake the feeling that you’re going to forget they’re there and step on them and break them or something.

                So no cats, and you can’t deal with looking at the dogs. Fish wouldn’t be right, because you want something to cuddle, and birds probably aren’t going to work for you either. You’re browsing through an exotic pet rescue, mostly from curiosity about what kind of exotic animals they’d even have, and that’s when you see your first troll. That’s not something you’d ever thought about. Trolls aren’t _rare_ or anything, but you don’t think you’ve ever known anybody who owned one. It’s not like having a pet tiger or something ridiculous like that, but it seems like there has to be something seriously tricky about it, or why wouldn’t everyone have one?

                A bit of poking around on the net mostly just makes you more curious. It looks like the biggest drawbacks are that they’re large (pffff, you had _Bec_ for years, like you need to worry about that!) and they’re smart. They do speech even better than parrots and mynah birds! How had you never thought about adopting one before? Because they are now officially some of the coolest pets you’ve ever seen. There can be temperament problems, apparently, but just like there aren’t any _naturally_ bad dogs, you’re pretty sure there aren’t naturally bad trolls. You’re feeling excited enough that when Dave messages you to ask why you’re up so late, you manage to message him back instead of pretending you fell asleep with your computer open, and tease him because he’s up just as late as you are.

                After you get some rest, you’re feeling less happy. You’re still interested! You definitely do want to adopt a pet, and you think trolls still sound really neat, you’re just not sure how much good it’ll actually do you. This is one of those days when it’s just too hard to even get out of bed, and you’re terrified that you’ll put all of you into this new project, somehow find the energy to throw yourself into this exciting new adventure, pour your heart into it, but at the end of it, you’ll be just as broken and useless as before.

                You fell asleep with your computer lying on the sheets right next to you. Once you haul it onto your chest and see a way-too-carefully-worded message from Rose asking whether you’d like her to fly out and visit, feeling angry at her (at yourself) is enough to kick you into action. You do your research on trolls— Maybe not as much research as you _should_ do, but honestly, how hard can being a pet owner be? It looks like trolls are pretty sturdy, which is probably for the best. It does catch your eye that temperamental trolls tend to run away. They’re super-duper smart and their paws are awfully close to fingers, so a product you see a lot of is variations on the invisible fence some people use for dogs, but with complicated collars that unlock with a key code, or with an actual key you’re supposed to hide. The talking thing comes up a few times too, and it’s weird to think of a pet that can do simple _conversations,_ but honestly it’s sounding better and better to you. It’d be a pet that can answer you if you want to talk, not just watch you with his head cocked to the side, looking like he can almost-not-quite understand human words. Like—Anyways. You’re researching trolls now.

                You look at wrigglers for almost an hour, and they’re cute as heck, but _wow_ that sounds like a lot of work (especially when it gets around to pupation time) and the little guys need a lot of care. Also, figuring out how to potty train a baby troll sounds super hard and complicated, with lots of inevitable messes along the way. Blech. And if you’re going to be honest, you shouldn’t be trusting yourself to be able to keep up with so much, not with how things have been lately. Instead, you decide to be responsible and start looking at shelters. You think what you’re after is an adult, one without major aggression issues, but that’s about all. You don’t have any animals or kids around the house, and probably won’t for a long time (if ever). You’re pretty sure that almost all the animals shelters near you are kill shelters, so if you can adopt a kind-of-difficult troll through a rescue group, it’s all for the better!

                There aren’t as many trolls up for adoption as there are dogs or cats, but it’s still pretty overwhelming. They all start to run together in your head after a while, and you’ve got a ton of tabs open, but nothing has hit you as ‘yes, this is the pet for me,’ and the prospect of going out to meet all these trolls in person and pick one is just. Wow. Yeah, that’s not happening. And of course, now that you’re thinking that adopting a pet might be too hard, your brain latches onto having a pet as _the only thing that will make you happy ever_. You’re so frustrated with yourself you could just scream! But then on one of the rescue pages you see a link to ‘special needs trolls,’ and go check it out.

                There are fewer trolls listed here than on the rest of the site, that’s for sure. You might say it’s even… a _manageable_ number of trolls (gasp)! Some of them are blind or deaf, a few are missing limbs, there’s a couple with weird medical conditions. And oh my god, you’re going to look like the worst person in the whole world for thinking this. But. Um. It sounds really, really good to have a pet that _depends_ on you. Oh no, that sounds horrible. But even with John and Dave and Rose worrying about you and talking to you and all that, you always, always, one hundred percent of the time feel like you could drop off the face of the earth and nobody would notice or care that you were gone. Bec and grandpa _needed_ you, and having that cut off so suddenly and leaving you so alone—Well. You don’t want to talk about it, end of story!! You’re a horrible, selfish person who wants a pet that will have to need you too.

                There are some justifications, that these pets are so much harder to get adopted, and that they’re more likely to be put down, but you know you’re being a selfish asshole. And you don’t want to be awful about this. But after grandpa ( _still not talking about it!),_ you know you have experience with someone who needs a lot of care and attention, and. It doesn’t have to be unhealthy, does it? Can’t you want someone to be counting on you, can’t you want to feel _wanted?_ Is that so awful? Yes, it really _is_ kind of that awful if you’re adopting a pet with that as your main goal. But it’s not your _main_ goal? You think? God, you barely know what’s going on in your head and it’s so awful and frustrating, and you’re worried you’re going to be an awful pet owner, the worst pet owner in the history of earth. But you’re won’t be, you’re honestly looking for a pet to love, who’ll love you back, even if some of your motivations in picking that pet are kind of sort of terrible.

                It’s about a week of second-guessing yourself, getting worked up over how you shouldn’t be getting a pet if you’re thinking this way about it, getting worked up over how this is the first thing you’ve thought of that might make you feel _better_ and now you’re just sabotaging yourself worrying over dumb things, and just generally finding new ways to get yourself worked up. It’s different from the numb inertia you’ve been stuck in for the last few months, but you don’t like it any better. And yet somehow, at the end of the week, you find yourself in a quiet room with an older woman and a troll, being interviewed about your suitability as a potential troll owner.

                Having experience with big pets is a major point in your favor. Having no experience with trolls, less so, but you think you can convince the adoption agency that you’re responsible enough to care for a blind pet. The troll you finally picked, Terezi, doesn’t have any history of violence, but you’ve been told she’s got some temperament issues that have made it difficult to place her. The lady interviewing you _says_ Terezi likes you, but since you’ve come in the room she’s just been staring at you without moving— even though she can’t _see_. It’s pretty unnerving! Her ears twitch at every sound, but the only other part of her that moves is her head as she stares (as she doesn’t stare?) at you as you walk around the room. It’s kind of eerie! But when you ask the lady interviewing you if she’s really, _really_ sure Terezi likes you, she tells you that Terezi would have made it very clear if that wasn’t the case.

                It’s super neat getting a look at a troll in person! Even though you’ve looked them over online (and even though Terezi is still just sitting next to the chair and refusing to move), it’s different getting to see one in real life. You do try holding out a hand for her, and she does sniff it, but she doesn’t really respond to you apart from that. You were kind of curious! Especially to hear her talk. The general consensus is that trolls are smarter than parrots, but that’s not any kind of precise measurement. Some people say they're as smart as humans, but that seems like a pretty extreme claim to make. Terezi does let you scratch her on the head! Her mane is nice and soft to touch. You hear trolls with bigger manes can get mats, but you think hers is short enough you’ll probably be fine. She still doesn’t move, except for the way her tail twitches back and forth while you ruffle the fur on the back of her neck.

                The questions don’t take all that long. You honestly don’t know that much about trolls, but you still think you did pretty well, and the lady interviewing you wraps it all up by asking Terezi if she’d like to say anything. Aah, yes please! You've been _dying_ to hear her talk this whole time. Troll lips aren’t too-too far from human lips, so you’re pretty sure it’s not like parrots, where it’s all in the tongue. But Terezi just stares not-quite-at-you for a minute, sighs, and stands up to pad over to you. Trolls can do the bipedal deal sometimes, but she comes over on all fours (her claws go tik-tik-tik on the floor and it’s sooooo cute!) and slowly rubs the side of her face across the front of your legs. And then she lies down across your feet. _Too_. _Adorable._

                Once she gets taken back with the other pets and you’re just sorting out paperwork, you do ask whether she has speech problems on top of the blind thing.

                “Oh no, she’s usually quite talkative. I believe in every other interview she’s been quite vocal about how strongly she _dis_ liked her potential new owner.”

                “How many interviews has she had?”

                The lady makes a face. Haha, that’s not good. But hey, you’re already on board and she did say that Terezi liked you! “She’s been a tricky one. I’m glad we're moving towards finding her a forever home.”

                All that you have left is the home inspection. You buy one of the invisible fence deals on your way back to your house, and getting that set up takes up the rest of your day. It’s actually pretty fun! You get to go digging in the yard, and oh boy, _heck_ yes, you even get to break out the circular saw to cut a trench across the base of your driveway. You’re riding high on excitement and feeling alive enough that you even manage to get yourself to go run an errand first thing the next day (you forgot you’d have to _patch_ the driveway, oops).

                The inspection is scheduled place three days after that. You feel busy again, cleaning up the house, getting rid of all the junk you let pile up. You know, realistically, that they’re only going to want to see that your house is livable, not that it’s _perfect_. But you know what your house should look like, and um, it didn’t take long for it to get pretty awful once you stopped keeping up with it. It doesn’t go as well as you’d hoped, because your energy runs out about a day into the cleaning, but at least you’ve gotten your home to a point where you’re not embarrassed to let people see it.

                You do manage to talk to your friends and tell them what you’re doing, and it’s so much better than having them _ask_ , and having nothing to say ever besides ‘nothing much.’ John thinks it’s awesome that you’re adopting a troll, Rose is more skeptical than she tries to sound, and Dave just doesn’t get what the point of pets is in the first place. And you love your friends, you really do, and you wish that you weren’t worrying them so much, but it can be _hard_ dealing with them when you know you’re all screwed up like this.

                Lately, Dave rambles in circles forever and ever, and you can’t tell what he’s looking for, but you know he’s looking for _something_ and you’re failing the mystery test every single time. Rose wants into your head (when does Rose _not_ want into people’s heads, that’s the real question), but all the time she’s handles you like something fragile and breakable and you can tell, you can always _tell_. John is almost the easiest, because he wouldn’t know subtle if it hit him in the face, but even fielding refreshingly blunt questions about how you’re doing gets so, so exhausting. So it’s easier to take the lead for once and show them you’re _doing_ something, but you still can’t help resenting that you feel like you have to prove that you aren’t just hiding in your room and rotting away. After you answer their questions about your (hopeful!) new pet, you’re just too tired to deal with any more conversation and run away to, um, ‘clean the house,’ yes, you’re definitely going to do that.

                You do try to relax, with limited success. You’re really excited and really afraid things are somehow going to go incredibly wrong, and you can’t shake the feeling that you’re going to be an awful, awful pet owner. Which is dumb, because you’ve been an awesome pet owner before! And you want a pet so badly, and you’ve only met Terezi for like half an hour but you’re already so excited about her living here with you (you bought like three pet bed and all kinds of toys and you have a million tabs open about how to create a stimulating environment for trolls). But at the same time you can’t shake the suspicion you just want a pet to depend on you because you’re too selfish and needy to cope without that kind of crutch.

                The home visit itself is an anticlimax. The inspectors just kinda wander around for a bit, check out your yard, and double check the invisible fence you installed. They warn you to keep dangerous substances out of reach because trolls are clever enough to get past cabinet doors, and that’s it, bam, you are approved to adopt your very own troll. Thursday morning you sign the papers and bring Terezi home. When you clip a leash onto her collar and start to head out the door to go home, she pauses turns, and says, “So long!” in a high, clear voice. So cute!! You wonder how big her vocabulary is. Hopefully she'll talk to you lots? The internet plain couldn’t agree on how smart trolls tend to be, and even though ‘can have simple conversations’ is pretty consistent, but you still aren't sure how much of the more outrageous claims you should believe!

                You forgot about getting a seat belt for her, that’s something you need to take care of. Bec’s might work—? But no, even though Terezi’s about the same length as he was, he was all fluff and bulk and she’s thin all over, with short, sleek fur. New seat belt it is. For now you carefully guide her up into the footwell, chatting away about this and that and what you’re doing, with absolutely _no_ idea how well she understands anything you’re saying, no response, bleh. Whatever! You babble away the whole drive home, with her sitting down in the footwell and not answering. You look down to see how she’s doing when you hit any stop signs or traffic lights, but she just stays curled where she is, not moving except for the way her ears swivel back and forth.

                Once you get home and pull into the driveway, you clip on the invisible fence collar before you can forget about it. How much training will she need? The fence doesn’t just shock you when you cross the border, it does a buzzy thing when you start to get close, so you’re hoping that works well for her. But since she’s blind, should you really let her outside alone in the first place? But argh, you also don’t want to just keep her inside all the time. You’d meant to do a lot more research on blind pets between the interview and the home inspection, but you’re having such an awful time keeping up with even basic necessities and there it is, you let something really important slip your mind. Good job, Jade. Fantastic.

                But! At least you can show Terezi your house, right? She’ll probably be a bit freaked out by a strange new place, and you can get all cuddly and show her where everything is and help her explore. It’ll be fun _and_ relaxing. Except no, because once you get her inside, the moment you unclip her leash, whoosh, there she goes off through the living room and dining room without a care in the world. Oh. You follow her, wondering if perhaps there was some mistake and she was able to see fine all along. But nope, she’s definitely blind, you see her bonk her head on the wall (just once), and instead of looking at stuff she’s licking (ew!) and sniffing.

                Basically, she seems incredibly self-sufficient, and you are a useless person who is useless. It’s a stupid, stupid thing to be unhappy about, and you know you’re such an _ass_ for feeling that way. But honestly—You’re not sure whether she needs you at _all_. Even when she manages to trap herself in a corner behind Grandpa’s old overstuffed armchair, she wiggles out under the chair and gets herself free before it can even occur to you to help. It’s—Good. It’s good that she can be independent and happy. Why on earth would you want things to be different from that? You still kind of really want to cry.

                You go plop down on a couch while Terezi rummages through the dining room. You’re _not_ sulking. That would be a stupid, immature response to something that isn’t even a problem. This is a _happy surprise_. Are you still about to melt down? Maybe!! _Fuck_. You look for any kind of distraction on your phone, and you carefully don’t pay attention as Terezi moves on to the kitchen. She can, whatever, chew on the pots and pans if she wants, everything edible is out of reach, even if she gets on her hind legs. You’re just over here being calm and grown-up and absolutely not resenting your pet troll because she isn’t completely dependent on you for everything.

                This is awful of you, you know it is. But you built up expectations in your head and they aren’t being met, and clearly it is the end of the world. Terezi isn’t going to be a helpless little thing clinging to you because she can’t do anything on her own, and you are _going to be happy for her or so help you_ —You just. Need to readjust. This is extra dumb of you, because blind people aren’t that helpless, so why would blind animals be? And trolls are the smartest animals out there. So not only did you wish that the pet that _you adopted_ was unhappy, but you’re perpetuating harmful stereotypes while you’re at it. _Wow_ ¸ good job. Fuck.

                You’re determinedly burying yourself in stupid internet games, which is why you miss it when Terezi heads upstairs. What you _don’t_ miss is when you hear an awful thumping clatter from the staircase behind you, and when you turn around, your troll is just landing at the foot of the stairs. Oh god. You’re trying to stumble upright and ask if she’s okay, and wow you are _maybe panicking a bit_ —But she just picks herself up off the ground, shakes her head a few times, and goes ambling off in the opposite direction.

                Okay. You. You are _definitely_ glad Terezi isn’t hurt. That would be the actual worst thing. But you have never felt like you mattered so little, and why is that the thing on your mind when _Terezi_ was the one who fell down the stairs? And why won’t she _say_ anything to you?? You’ve heard her talk—Not a word to _you_ of course, that would just be _silly_. You don’t know what you want. You don’t know what you want. You’re not happy. You haven’t been happy for a while, but now you are _extra_ unhappy and yep, there it is the thing you did to make your life better has spectacularly backfired and is making you miserable. Awesome.

                You can’t right now. You just can’t. You make sure the front door is locked, you drag yourself up the stairs, and you collapse into bed. What time is it, two? That’s practically night. You’re just. You’re going to sleep.

                Eventually you wake up. You try not to, but there’s always eventually a certain point where you’re rested enough that you _can’t_ sleep and instead you just wind up staring at the ceiling wishing you weren’t awake. It’s dark outside. When you roll over to drag your computer onto your chest, instead of finding your laptop sitting on the sheets, your fingers run into a warm, furry body. You maybe scream a little.

                You roll over the other way and turn on your bedside lamp. Your hands are fucking _shaking_ — _God_. When you sit up, Terezi’s just sitting there, blinking at you, because _of course_ she is. You knead your eyes with the heels of your hands, and try very hard not to shout at her. This. Is not anybody’s fault. You have to remember that.

                When you think you’ve got yourself back under control, you ask, “ _Why??_ ” Not because you want (or expect) an answer, but holy shit, your life just flashed before your eyes and you are going to say _something._

                So you’re taken by complete surprise when Terezi laughs and says, “No pets on the furniture?”

                That’s—Um. She _does_ talk to you. Apparently. “I, I, no— pets on the furniture are fine.” She’s just grinning from ear to ear with all sorts of pointy teeth showing. She isn’t saying a word, though. “Did you… want something?”

                She tilts her head to the side, still with the same creepy-wide grin. “I have not been fed!”

                Oh. _Oh_. Oh shit, you are the worst pet owner, it is you. Not one day into adopting a pet, and you’ve already fucked up. Would you have even realized if she couldn’t talk? _Toddlers_ are more responsible than you are. You bury your face in your hands and force yourself to take a long, slow breath. You have to apologize. This. You get as far as, “I’m—” But then your throat closes up and you can’t go on. This should have been so simple and you are _not handling it—_

                You sob, once, before you get control of yourself. Terezi doesn’t say anything, but you feel the bed shift. When you peek between your fingers, she’s lying down with her head resting on her paws, just a few inches from your knee. Her ears twitch with every breath you take. She’s still smiling wide enough to show all those teeth, but it looks a little uncertain around the edges.

                “…Will I be fed?”

                “No, I—I mean _yes_ , yes I’m going to feed you. I just—Give me. I need a, a moment.”

                “Mmm.” She pauses, then lifts her head and tilts it to the side again. “You should feed me human food.”

                You’re still having trouble processing this. She’s been ignoring you so hard, and all of a sudden she starts talking and asking for things? No, of course she’d talk to you when you’re accidentally _starving_ her, you asshole. Get your act together. “But I bought troll food. I bought _nice_ troll food.”

                When you drop your hands from your face, she backs up on the bed, just out of arm’s reach. “I regret to inform you that the nice troll food tastes like wriggler tears and sawdust.”

                “How do you know _that_??”

                “No pets on the counters?”

                “ _Terezi._ ”

                You’re actually kind of more amused than upset, but she backs up even further, all the way down to the foot of the bed. She looks like she might be about to bolt. Are you—What does she think you’re going to do to her?

                You rub at your forehead. You are way too exhausted to deal with this. “What kind of people food?”

                “Hm?”

                “What kind of people food are you looking for?”

                Her tail curls around her paws, the tip twitching back and forth as she laughs. “I am an obligate carnivore! I could not help but notice a container full of _delicious_ -smelling ham in your refrigerator…”

                “You went in the _fridge_?” Terezi is still laughing, but she still looks ready to run for it on a moment’s notice. “Do you think I’m going to… hurt you?”

                You can tell when she forces herself to relax. Or at least she forces herself to _look_ relaxed. “I merely took a peek, to assess the options available to me! Your various delectable human foods remain utterly and completely unpillaged.” She pauses for a moment, and does the head-tilt thing again. “Not all humans react pleasantly when rules are broken.”

                “Not _this_ human!”

                “That was also my assessment! And that is why I did _not_ choose to pee on you at our first meeting.” She edges a tiny bit closer. “I am quite hungry.”

                You know what, it’s not like you can ever get yourself to eat much these days. If you leave the meat there, it’s probably going to just get nasty before you ever get around to touching it. You sigh. “Fine.”

                Terezi bounces down off the bed while you’re swinging yourself over the edge. She leads the way out into the hall. For a moment you think she’s about to take another fall down the stairs. She comes _really_ close to taking a wrong step, and you’re halfway diving down to catch her when she finds her footing and goes eeling down the staircase. You’re left on your knees on the carpet, looking like a total dork.

                Not the time to be stressing over dumb things you shouldn’t be stressing over. You should absolutely not be angry at her for not being as disabled as you assumed she was. That, wow, that would be totally awful of you. You think you _are_ allowed to be a little upset that she’s doing things that make you legitimately worried about her safety. She _did_ fall earlier. And she almost did again just now.

                You rub at your forehead as you go down the stairs, because you’re honestly starting to get a stress headache over this. “So, is there any way to make it so I’m _not_ afraid you’re about to fall and break your neck? I don’t know, maybe a gate that you could unlatch?”

                She’s already gone into the kitchen. And when you turn the corner, she already has the fridge propped open, and she’s shoved one of the chairs over to climb up and get at your food. “For the stairs? I think I’m doing well enough.”

                Yes, but— “It’s only going to take one bad fall before that gets ugly. _Please_ can I do something?”

                Her paws are surprisingly dexterous. She already has the ham sitting on the chair next to her leg, and she’s rummaging through your other leftover containers. “Hmm. Something bright. Put some paint at the top of the stairs? Or colorful tape would work.”

                “But you’re… blind?”

                She laughs. “Effectively! But not entirely. If you make things bright enough, I can tell that the color is there.” She gives you a sideways look. “You might put it on door frames too. Or get some brightly colored flags to mark the fence outside. I do appreciate the amount of space I have to work with!”

                You groan. “You went _outside?”_

                “Don’t worry, I relocked the door.”

                Okay, you are out of your depth. You have no idea which way is up with the blind thing, which you already _knew_ , but it’s more embarrassing to be getting totally owned by Terezi when you should have already researched it yourself. And on top of that, you also managed to go sulk and sleep while your _brand new pet_ that you should have been watching had free reign over the house—and appears to have taken complete advantage of it. You’re in some awkward place between complete frustration (at her? at you?) and amusement.

                You don’t even know how to react anymore, so you just take the ham and dig out a cutting board, and start dicing it up. A couple minutes too late, you say, “You shouldn’t have done that.” She doesn’t answer but you hear a thump from behind you, and seconds later, a grey-and-black head pops up at the counter underneath your left arm. She starts snatching bits and pieces of ham while you’re still dicing. “You shouldn’t do that either.”

                She edges a little ways off to the side… and keeps stealing pieces of meat. The work is nice and mechanical, just chop-chop-chop, with Terezi clearing ham from the cutting board as you go. Eventually, you say, “Bright tape?”

                “Mm.” Chewing noises. “I should be able to see it.”

                “How would—Are you… like, partly blind?”

                “Almost entirely!”

                “Were you born like that? Or, um, hatched?”

                She shakes her head. “Infection! At a certain point it would have been reversible, but, well. It was an opportunity to share _how_ my owner had let things progress to that point! So it all worked out quite well in the end.”

                “ _Oh_. I. The website didn’t say you’d been—”

                She laughs though, bright and clear. “I appear to be quite resilient! Though I did make an effort to intelligently select my next owner.”

                You smile a little at that. “And what were you looking for?”

                “Someone who would feed me delicious _ham_.” There’s a few moments of comfortable silence, and then she says, “Why don’t you sleep in the larger bedroom with the better bed?”

                You almost cut your finger open. Terezi’s stepping slowly back when you turn toward her, and you realize with a considerable amount of horror that you’re still holding the knife. You carefully put it down, and turn yourself back to the cutting board. “I wouldn’t like. To speak about it.”

                And just look at you. Look at you overreacting to a perfectly reasonable question, _right after_ Terezi told you her original owner—. What the hell is your problem. Your hands don’t feel like they’re attached to you, but you pick up the knife and slowly go back to dicing ham. You wonder if Terezi also found the bag of dog toys in the closet that you just couldn’t bring yourself to throw away. She isn’t taking ham from the cutting board anymore, just standing against the opposite wall of the kitchen.

                You shut your eyes and take a deep breath, letting it out slow and easy. Then you turn to Terezi and smile. “I’m sorry. Would you like try meatballs?”

                It’s a few minutes before she gets that close to you again. But meatballs apparently make an excellent peace offering, and you are informed that tomatoes _and_ meat together is the best food combination ever invented. Ha, you’re almost tempted to add cheese to the mix and see what she thinks about that, but you should _really_ do some research on troll diets before you do too much experimenting. You’re pretty sure that in the end, Terezi eats half her body weight in leftovers from your fridge. It’s pretty hilarious watching her go, but it can’t last forever, and eventually you’re at the sink washing the (multiple) leftover containers that she, personally, is responsible for emptying, and she’s sitting next to your feet grooming tomato sauce out of her front paws.

                It’s… peaceful. Admittedly, you are totally lost, and you’re pretty sure Terezi is having a fantastic time keeping you off-balance. This isn’t at all what you were expecting, but letting Terezi sample the heck out of your fridge at three in the morning is a hell of a lot better than staring at your ceiling and trying not to cry at three in the morning. It bursts out of you awkward and out of place, and about twenty minutes late—“My grandfather died.”

                You’re watching Terezi from the corner of your eye, and she pauses, then puts the paw she was grooming down to the ground. “Your dog too.”

                Even though you were halfway expecting it, you almost drop the container you’re washing. You don’t answer her.

                “It is fairly clear if you know what to look for.” She lets out a wide yawn and stretches. “You have fed me a great deal of delicious human food! As this household’s designated replacement pet, I think I feel comfortable in volunteering my services for whatever you may desire.”

                You almost laugh, because of course she’s just being silly. But you open your mouth, and what comes out is “Can we—”

                Whoops, nope! You clamp right down on that. But Terezi tilts her head to the side and asks, “Can we…?”

                Does she mean it? She can’t, right? She barely even _likes_ you. But it falls out of your mouth anyways, because you’re so lonely and you’ve missed this for so long, and, “Can we cuddle?”

                She solemnly bows her head and agrees, and you’re pretty sure the joke is on you somehow, but she seems perfectly willing as she leads the way out of the kitchen and back up the stairs. You’re watching how she climbs, and you’re not going to lie, it’s pretty impressive how she barely misses a beat when she hits the top of the staircase and there isn’t another stair when she tries to put her foot down. You can go buy tape tomorrow. Something green, or red, nice and bright.

                When you slip into your bed and she bounces on up after you, both of you are a little lost. She takes a half step forward, and you try to lie down and accidentally get a hand under her paw. Both of you pause. Haha, totally awkward. Then Terezi leans in and licks you from chin to forehead, and just laughs and laughs when you flinch away and wipe at your face, and it isn’t long before you’re laughing just as hard as she is. It feels... _good_ to laugh again. She burrows up under your arm with her head butting against the bottom of your chin, and you settle the blankets over you both. She’s warm and soft against you, with her paws tucked carefully up between your stomachs, and while you gently ruffle the fur between her ears, you can feel yourself drifting off back to sleep.

**Author's Note:**

> [Tumblr](http://spockandawe.tumblr.com/post/108471537871/leave-me-drowning-anonymous-homestuck-archive)


End file.
